Job Seekers

Hey, good morning, y'all. Wow, y'all are all fired up, right? So today we're gonna spend about 10, 12 minutes, and I want to talk to you today about the truth. You know, and I put the screen up. Dave said, "You can't handle the truth." You know, and everybody knows that line, right? Everyone know that line, right? I'm not as good at it as Jack Nicholson is, but hopefully today we'll discover some truths. One of the things I'd just like to start with is this phrase from the Bible in Ephesians 4:25. It says, "Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another." Would y'all pray with me real quick? Father God, thank you today for today and for these men and women that are in the room, for the opportunities that you've laid before them. Lord, sometimes the challenges we have, we don't recognize them, but they are opportunities. As we go through today, Lord, I hope that I could speak your truth to these people, that it would be impactful, that they would leave here encouraged, enriched, refreshed, and ready to take on the day. Lord, as we go throughout the day, I pray that we would be inspirations to those that we come in contact with, that we would inspire positive change in the lives that we encounter. That we would come home and be a positive impact in our homes and in our communities. Lord, we ask all of these things in your name. Amen. So the truth— speak it to each other. Well, the reason that I wanted to talk to you about the truth today is because— how many of you have seen me speak here before? I get to come here. Wow, I guess the word's out I'm here, so everybody— I'm not coming. Y'all all sat in the back too, so I guess that's, that's No, the truth is that I've spoken here several times. I've always enjoyed speaking here, and generally speaking, when I come speak here, what I try to do is I try to share something that will help you in your search. Because how many of you here are searching right now for full-time employment? Well, all your hands should be up, right? I mean, except for the ship's crew. The truth is there's a lot of work to do with the truth. 91% of us, 91% of us, if we're asked at the end of the day today, would confess that we lied somewhere in the day, just today, much less next day or yesterday, right? The fact is, is we are a society of liars. Not just a society of liars, we are a race of liars. Our, the human race is defined by many, many things, but one of the things the human race is most defined by is our ability to lie. We've lied since the beginning in the garden. And so it's important to recognize that this is not something that just has you as a problem. Now, yeah, you— I don't have that problem, but you do. Everyone has the problem of lying. And the problem with lying is, is that it leads us to think that lying isn't that important. How many of you are Facebookers? LinkedIn? How many of you have seen this shot this week? This shot right here came across my Facebook page. Do you recognize that it's the Tomb of the Unknowns? Pouring down rain in the middle of Hurricane Sandy. Comes across and the caption says, "Wow, what dedication." And I look at that and I said, "You bet." And I put on there, "Duty, duty, sacrifice, honor, "Thank you." I think that's what I put and forwarded it on to my group. And then the following morning I opened up and I looked at the internet and lo and behold, I lied to everybody on my Facebook page because that picture was taken in September. It wasn't even Hurricane Sandy. Now, is it wonderful that they have duty and sacrifice and honor, and are we lucky to live in a country where people like this are willing to do the things that we are not willing to do so that we have our freedom absolutely. But the fact is, a lie's a lie. I lied to everybody I knew that day. So I published a, a retraction basically in, on my blog, and you can read it if you wish to at glengould.net. But the fact is, the truth is the truth, and the truth matters. So we're gonna talk today about 5 lies that I believe you're probably telling yourselves right now. Because the truth is, the worst lies are the ones we tell ourselves. You know, I thought of this phrase last night when I was getting ready for this talk, and I thought, "Wow, that's a great quote." And being a speaker, I've learned to go and find out if somebody else has already given me the quote and I just didn't know it, right? So, I thought, "Wow, that's gonna be a great quote. I'm gonna be known by that one. That's awesome." Well, unfortunately, Richard Bach, the author of Jonathan Livington's Gould is the one who said it, and I just picked it up somewhere along the line. But the fact is, the worst lies are the ones we're telling ourselves. So I'm gonna share with you 5 that I think you're probably sharing with yourself right now, 5 that I hope that we can debunk so that you can move forward, because right now is a critical time, a critical time in your job search. So y'all with me? Will you confess if you lie, if you're saying these lies for yourself, or if you have recently? How about number 1? No one's hiring. Is that true? Of course it's not true, right? But the fact is, is that we're hearing it every single day. No one's hiring you. If— depending upon who you listen to for your news, you will hear the jobs are— I mean, it's just the worst economy and the worst possible job market in history, or you'll hear that we have the lowest unemployment rate that we've had in 48 months. Truth is, in September there was 114,000 increase in jobs. That's taking into account the people who were unemployed that got jobs and also the new jobs that were added. 114,000 increase in people that were employed just in the month of September alone. Lie number 2: Everyone's looking for younger workers. I look around the room today and, uh, how many of you are born after 1981? 1, 2, 3. So we're all baby boomers for the most part, right? Do you feel like maybe they're looking for younger people? Right? I mean, come on, let's face it. Why would somebody invest time and energy and talent in me when I've only got 5, 10, 15 years left in the workforce? Here's a statistic that hiring people know that you don't know. 80% of the people who are employed today will switch jobs in the next 2 years. 80% will switch jobs in the next 2 years. Why? Because everybody's settled right now. We, we're, we've just taken whatever we could get because the fact is none of us are happy in our jobs. It's not what we planned to do, it's what the economy and what circumstances have forced us to do. But here's the other statistic, the other truth. By 2015, the largest segment of employees will be under 30. Leaders will be under 30 in 3 years. You think companies aren't desperate for experience? You are perfect for them right now. They're begging for experienced, mature people who know how to work and have a work ethic, 'cause let me tell you something, the number one characteristic of this group of people is they have no work ethic. Now that's not my words, that's the, that's employee, employer's words. The fact is there's a lot of them who do, but that's another lie. Lie number 3, the holidays are the worst time to get a job. Do you believe that? Do you believe it's the worst time to get your right job? Come on, maybe, right? I know I can get a job, you kidding? I mean, after all, look at this, UPS is going to hire 55,000 people Target about 90,000 people. 35% of all retailers say they will hire more during this period than they ever will. So there's lots of jobs out there, but my job's not, right? But the truth is people are hiring. So that's a lie. I need permanent employment. I should just wait until after the holidays because if I get wrapped up in one of these temporary jobs, I mean, who knows what'll happen. Next thing you know, I'm a cashier at Target in January, February, and March, and I can't provide for my family on that kind of money. You ever think these things? Well, here's the truth about that lie. CNN reports that December is the best time of all to look for a job. As a matter of fact, because so many of you job seekers will quit looking in the holidays, there's less competition. Because there are so many holiday parties and get-togethers and socials where you can actually show that you're a human being as opposed to a body sitting in a chair wanting your money. Because that really, that's what an employer thinks. There's a body sitting in that chair wanting my money, right? So, but now there's socials and there's opportunities and networking opportunities. This is the best time of all to be seeking a job. Because December is the best time. You'll be able to interact with more people and you'll have less competition. Lie number 5: I'm doing the best I can. I'd love to see how many of you would raise your hand and say that's not true. Nobody will, but the fact is none of us are. I got this from an employer I had a long time ago. I used to, back in the dark days when we didn't have the internet, every Friday a Federal Express letter would come to my house where I was, 'cause I was an outside employee, and it would have the memo from the president of the company, and I will never forget this one as long as I live. It said, "Boss, I'm doing the best I can." Well, pal, sometimes your best just isn't good enough. Because our best together has not been good enough. And if you're doing the best you can, I'm sorry, but sometimes the best isn't good enough. You're gonna have to be better than your best. You have to be better than your best. Now, you're much better than you were before you came in here today because you demonstrated you're willing to do what other people are not willing to do. Do you think these are the only people in the Peachtree City area that are unemployed? Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. We could fill this room 50 times over, probably. The fact is you're willing to do what other people aren't willing to do, but you're going to have to do better than your best. So here's my encouragement to you. At the end of wherever your job search day is, for most of you it may be noon, which isn't good. Some of you, come on, let's face it, it's 10 AM. And be honest, some of you are taking the day off other than today. Okay, but wherever that last day is, commit to make one more phone call. Commit to send one more email. Commit to follow up on one more opportunity. Just one. Just one. And here's the second thing you need to commit to. Commit to not letting the phone touch— or the receiver touch the phone. Now most of us are doing it on cell phones now, right? So we have to commit to not putting the cell phone down. If you commit to hanging up like this and dialing another number, if you commit to putting the phone instead of like this, like this and dialing another number, I promise you things will happen fast for you. But those are the lies that we're telling each other. The worst lies of all are the ones that we're telling ourselves. And so I hope that you will remember as you're going throughout the day that you're lying to yourself pretty much all the time. We all are. So that's not an indictment on you, it's an indictment on all of us. That's the fact of the human condition. And of course, you probably know this from the Bible as well, "Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free." That's John 8:32. Of course, most of us recognize that the truth is Jesus. But the Bible is so adaptable, it applies to everyday life as well. And the fact is that I believe this, if you know the truth about yourself, if you know the truth that you're lying to yourself, that you're constantly having conversations with yourself that are defeating you. And you start to say, you know what, I'm not going to listen to that anymore. I'm not going to talk about that anymore. All I'm going to do is move forward. I'm just going to keep trying. I'm going to keep going. I'm going to keep moving one step forward. If you stop those conversations of, well, they'll never hire me. If you stop those conversations of, well, there's going to be 300 people applying for that job. I'll never get it. And guess what? We all do it. We all do it. Hey, do you think that there are not jobs that I look at and I go, gosh, it'd be cool to be the— you know, the president of this or the, you know, head of that or whatever, and I go, ah, they'd never hire me for that. Why even bother? Now, I'm perfectly happy where I am, don't get me wrong, but we all need to strive forward. So wherever you are right now, I'm going to encourage you, know the truth, do the best you can, and then one step further, and I think that your job search will be far more successful. Dave? Thank y'all.